This book is a unique source of information about U.S. troop involvement in South Vietnam from 1965 to 1972. It stresses that Vietnam was a war without fronts or battle lines—a war different from any that the United States had previously fought.
Part One: Basic Patterns of this War Without Fronts
1. Why was the war so Confusing?
2. The Where and When of Combat
3. Where Did the $150 Billion Go?
4. Goliath Versus David: The Forces Involved Part Two: The "Main Force" War
5. The Name of the Communist Game: Small Unit Actions
6. Allied Ground Operations are Difficult to Analyze
7. South Vietnamese Forces
8. Did Airpower work?
9. Stalemate: The Americans Couldn't Win Part Three: The Casualty Toll
10. Who Got Killed?
11. American Casualties Analyzed
12. More than a Million Civilian Casualties Part Four Pacification: "The Other War"
13. How Secure was the Countryside?
14. The Territorial Forces: Unsung Heroes
15. Vietnamese Popular Attitudes
16. Chieu Hoi: Defections from the Communist Side
17. Dismantling the Communists Subversive Apparatus Part Five: Civil Operations
18. The Enormous Refugee Burden
19. Land Reform: Best of this Century?
20. Inflation: War-Fueled but Well-Controlled Part Six: A Summing Up
21. Epilogue: 1975
22. Some Conclusions
Thomas C Thayer
